Sunday, February 22, 2015

Good Morning Jacob

Letter to my SonSunday, 22 February

Good Morning Jacob…

It’s raining outside. The
last of our snow will soon wash away. Today
will no longer be cold as temperatures return to the fifties.

I try to live my life objectively – making sure everything adds up
correctly, no matter how I slice it. But
I try to bend the rules to my way of thinking and the setbacks are predictable. Still, I remain committed to bargaining with
life.

I draw pictures that start as doodles. There’s very little thought given them at the
time. I just proceed with whatever seems
an opportune image. Maybe I visualize
just a mouth on the paper. There is no
plan. This isn’t always the case, though. Sometimes I attempt to draw something
real. Later I doodle over it. The item becomes a story. Here’s an obsessive quality to be exploited.

There’s a downside to everything we choose to do.

Words usually tie things together that makes sense. It’s rational but incomplete. We can’t quantify everything, thank God. People want to move beyond common sense. We need mystery. Our greatest minds feed on it: Einstein, Newton, Shakespeare. They had no desire to ever stop puzzling.

Reason is useful in avoiding loss of life. We want to stick around and puzzle over all
the pleasure of physical existence. What
is love? See – here is something that
can’t be quantified. Why would you want
to? Do you really want to erase
enjoyment of its mystery? Like I’m
actually worried that would
happen. How much thought has been given
love in writing and song? Rhetorical
question; the point is how little progress we've made in its understanding. For instance, what motivates its
evolution? I assume love has progressed
up the evolutionary scale. But what does
all this matter to two people finding themselves alone together on a June night? Mystery lets imagination go to work. This can make for a wonderfully personal reality…
something worth posting on the refrigerator door.